May 25

Thanks for your great email. Hna Gonzales also says that I am thought of as pretty calm among the missionaries in the pension.

Thanks for sending me things, I'll let you know in a few weeks when I get them.

There´s not much to say about this week and I don't have any pictures. This morning we went as a zone (13 people) to play wally (volibol in a boxlike room like racket ball) and eat pizza. I´m not a huge fan of wally, but I like pizza and doing things as a zone. Hna Gonzales took some pictures so I might send them to you in a few weeks.

Yes, missionaries go to Potosi in addition to Cochabamba and Sucre, also Tupiza, Villazon, and Quiriza, but the last two only have elders. I´m not sure what you mean by zones within Cochabamba (or Cbba for short). Within the department (state) of Cbba there are a dozen or so provinces (a county, more or less, I think), but I don´t know their names. With in the city of Cbba places in the city are refered to by if they are in the north or south or near a major road and, within the church, by stake and ward. There are about 7 or so stakes in the city. Yes, there is a ton of uninhabited parts. I have trouble discribing how Acton isn´t in the city, but isn't a pueble (village) either.

I also think that Hna Gonzales and I will stay together this cambio. We are getting along okay. I wish she was more patient with my Spanish, which is good, but not perfect, and I'm sure she wishes I would hear her right the first time, and not be so awkward over the phone, and who knows what else bothers her, but mostly we get along okay.

We had a great zone meeting lesson Tuesday (every Tuesday we have district meeting for about an hour and zone meeting for about half an hour) about being in the present. We read the scripture that says for everything there is a season and the story of Lot's wife who looked back to the city thinking about her riches that she was leaving behind and what she would like to do with them in the future instead of focusing on the present moment and what she was supposed to be doing in that moment. Thus we've been joking a lot this week about how we shouldn´t do our daily and weekly planning because that is thinking about the future. But really, it's very good advice to stay in the moment and not be thinking about the next month or next pday.

Other interesting things I´ve noticed about Bolivia is the traces of socialism/comunism. For example, a little boy in a family we teach is called Vladimir Ilich (he goes by ilich, who his mother tells us was someone important in the Russian revelution). Also, an investigator, Gonzalo, who is a bit elderly, likes to tell us all about what Bolivia was like when he was younger, including spending several months traveling and working on different farms. He says that a group of people would be invited to a farm, harvest rice all day and dance and party in the night and the next day be invited to another farm and do the same thing until the rice harvesting season was over. He says it was great fun for a young adult, but that in the end you worked all month or more without gaining anything. I actually don´t know anything about how Bolivia´s politics work, despite paying attention to the city elections (the people with the green banners won is about all I know).

I'm glad you were able to have lunch with Heather and Beth. Aunt Beth is writing to me every once in a while, which is cool.